My dad’s senile aunt bought me this book for Christmas in what must have been 1992 or 1993, and while I thought it looked dumber than dumb I absolutely fell in love with it. I can’t find the cover, but here’s the UK version!
Our heroine, Nicola, is looking pretty fierce there with her imaginary mouse. But Rose? Rose is not nearly as fat or gingerrific as I had envisioned.
Basically, Nicola is a tomboy who gets overlooked constantly for her high-maintenance, “talented” little sister Rose. Nicola is a beanpole who loves footie (soccer, you heathens) and watches Crystal Palace matches with her pops and can’t be concerned with girl-like things. She also loves tormenting Rose, because it’s just so easy. She draws faces on her expensive tap shoes, coerces her into sniffing sneezing powder, the works. Rose, on the other hand, is a demon sent straight from fat ginger bitch hell. She is the most obnoxious, horrid, irredeemable character that doesn’t have the last name of Wakefield that I’ve read in a long time. In essence, Rose is a stage kid – actress, model, dancer, whatever (hee, UL reference) who really isn’t all that fantastic.
One day, while Nicola was running around completely unsupervised as usual because her mother is a wretched, negligent windbag, she goes to this abandoned building or construction site or whatever and takes her frustrations about her nasty sister out there. She pirouettes in the mud and makes up silly songs just railing on Rose, and it’s fantastic. The best part, though, is that she gets caught by this woman named Mrs. French who thinks she has some real talent. She accompanies Nicola back to her home, where her mom rips her a new asshole for playing at the building site and in no uncertain terms tells Mrs. French that WELL, ROSE IS OUR LITTLE DANCER, NOT NICOLA.
I fucking hate Nicola’s mom.
Anyway, as it turns out, Mrs. French (as Rose obnoxiously points out) studied at the Royal Academy of Ballet and is quite good and discerning natural talent, and she truly believes Nicola has some. Rose changes her mind about which of her “many talents” she’s going to capitalize on (might I suggest one that involves a drive thru window?) and it drives her sister bonkers. The fact that Mrs. French wants Nicola causes incredible tension in the house (because Rose is INSUFFERABLE, I cannot point this out enough here) and finally her dad is like oh Nickers, why don’t you just come watch Crystal Palace with me and give up this silly girl business. So she does – she gives up her dreams for Rose. For probably the BILLIONTH FREAKING TIME. So infuriating.
What planet do parents in YA books come from, and can we nuke it?
Rose falls ill during the rehearsal for one of her dumb things (the part she stole from her sister, actually,) and Nicola steps in. Not surprisingly, she’s a hit and everyone loves her because she’s not an ungracious sea hag ginger beast. Mrs. French has decided to drop Rose for Nicola in this particular role and create a new role especially for her. Rose. Is. PISSSSSSSSSSED. There is a fabulous scene where she goes absolutely batshit and god, it is glorious. When I get my hard copy of the book (it’s at John’s right now, of all places) I’ll type up the passage because it needs to be shared with everyone.
Anyway of course, since it’s YA fiction, everything works out. Nicola gets the chance of a lifetime and might even move on to more fantastic roles. Rose gets what she wants. Their mom remains an insufferable asshat. And I think Crystal Palace wins a match by the end of the book, so yay dad.
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